ARU calls in consultants to handle Wallabies crisis

The ARU has called in an external media management consultant to help deal with the crisis surrounding Kurtley Beale's misconduct allegation and drafted in injured former Wallabies captain Stephen Moore to help steer the team back on track before the tour of Europe.

With the Wallabies due to fly out next Friday for the start of their five-week spring tour, Moore met with ARU integrity officer Phil Thomson and general manager of development pathways Ben Whitaker to devise a structure to help embattled Wallabies coach Ewen McKenzie.

Pulver announced the move to staff at a meeting at the union's St Leonards headquarters on Tuesday, praising the work of the ARU's internal communications team but conceding extra help was being called in.

The ARU would not release the name of the firm but said, via a spokeswoman, that "we deal with external providers on a range of issues in our day-to-day business".

Advertisement

The extra set of hands cannot come quick enough as the ARU battles to contain further leaks from within its own ranks.

At the same all-staff meeting on Tuesday, Pulver criticised Wallabies captain Michael Hooper for his public support of teammate Beale.

Pulver also took aim at Waratahs Rugby chairman Roger Davis for backing NSW coach Michael Cheika's attempts to keep Beale in the game. He said he considered the messages Beale allegedly sent to former business manager Di Patston a "dismissable offence".

When contacted by Fairfax Media, Pulver denied criticising Hooper, saying he only questioned the wisdom of his comments, but stood by the comments about Beale's conduct.

"I said that when I looked at that incident, if anyone in my team inside the ARU sent text messages with that type of comment and content, that I considered it a dismissable offence.

"I was crystal clear, to the team I presented to, that Kurtley gets a chance to present his case."

Asked whether his comments could be interpreted as a pre-judgment of a case set down for a hearing before an independent tribunal, Pulver said: "In between me and my senior employees [outside the Wallabies], my position remains that I would dismiss them immediately, but there is a different process in place for a player that is really governed by the agreements we have with RUPA [the Rugby Union Players' Association]."

During the meeting, Pulver also told staff he had asked McKenzie directly about the nature of his relationship with Patston. He said he believed McKenzie when the Wallabies coach told him it was platonic.

Former Wallaby Rod Kafer called on the ARU to install a Wallabies team manager and an over-arching high performance boss to act as "objective" middle-men between future coaches and the ARU executive.

Kafer backed McKenzie's work with the Wallabies on the field but said the events of recent months proved the team structures set up by the coach left him ill-equipped to deal with the off-field dynamics in play at a high-performance sporting team, and left the ARU without any checks and balances.

"One of the key strategies for the ARU is to ensure at all times they have a link between the ARU CEO and the board, and the Wallabies team, that is not the Wallabies coach," Kafer said.

"The coach is always a position that is transient and built around performance that can ebb and flow, and their longevity is linked to the cycle of the team."

McKenzie this week defended the structure he set up at the start of this year, when long-standing team manager Bob Egerton left and was replaced by Patston and a logistics manager.

"It's a lot different to the game as it was 20 years ago, when the team manager wore the blazer, had the keys to the mini bar, went to all the functions," he said.

"It's a significant business. You're moving 46 people around the world for 140 days ... It's a $20 million cost to run the Wallabies around that period."

Kafer said the Wallabies appeared to have suffered from a lack of an objective, authoritative voice beyond the head coach.

"One of the models that's worked well has been a team manager who is not the guy with the keys to the mini bar, but a guy who has very strong administrative and business skills, and a very strong, long history with the game of rugby, who can understand it, but give an objective view on the team's welfare, wellbeing and performance, outside of what everyone hears from the media, the coach, or a game on television," he said.

"The most precious resource in Australian rugby is the Wallabies and the Wallabies brand, and for the board and senior executive to not be as close as they could be seems a little bit naive."

Poll

Is Ewen McKenzie the right man to take the Wallabies to the World Cup in England?

Yes38%

No62%

Total votes: 7665

Poll closed 27 Oct, 2014

Disclaimer: These polls are not scientific and reflect the opinion only of visitors who have chosen to participate.